Wednesday, May 29, 2013

We've all heard stories of someone missing a plane that eventually crashed with no survivors, and considered him/her supremely lucky and meant for great things. Indeed whether he/she had made the flight or not, the plane would have crashed and he/she would have died along with the rest.

But this morning, I read a story where a car with five teenagers aboard, two boys and three girls, suffered a fiery crash, with likewise no survivors. The story was about a boy whose father forbade him to join the planned triple-date outing, and lived to see the tragedy on the news. And of course we consider him supremely lucky as well.

But now a question arose in my mind. Let's for argument's sake take the accident as a two car collision (which it wasn't) where the car was T-boned by a heavy truck that ran a red light at high speed. Had this lucky boy been able to join the ride, there would have been slight changes in the timing of all relevant events, including the extra pick-up and delays, and the collision would probably not have happened.

Then arose the greater question: We are all passengers in "spaceship Earth" which is hurtling towards a predicted and dreaded fate. Are we all doomed like those on the ill-fated plane. or destined to save ourselves and all life on Earth at this critical juncture by virtue of our being on board?

Monday, May 27, 2013

There is an ideology floating around in the vegan community that early humans were vegans, so: "therefore, we modern humans should also be vegans", whereas it is a proven fact that paleo-humans were OMNIVORES, as are all contemporary tribal cultures, except some which inhabit Arctic and Sub-Arctic regions, who are CARNIVORES.

It is true that contemporary "sport" hunters use this as a justification for continued hunting, but to "FOLLOW tradition" is their mind set, not ours. That in the AR/Vegan movement is, or should be, to RISE ABOVE tradition on to a NEW trajectory. We are not traditonalists; we are revolutionaries.

Paleo-humans and contemporary tribals were and are omnivorous/carnivorours hunter-gatherers, because:

1. They simply could not and cannot afford to be choosy. It was/is a matter of survival and necessity. lf they turn over a rotting log and find insect grubs, they won't discard them out of a sense of disgust or morality.

2. Veganism based on anti-cruelty is not a paleo-concept and animal RIGHTS is not a tribal concept.

3. The human dentition was inherited from the early tree-dwelling primates, which needed strong molars to crush nuts and masticate vegetative matter.

4. Some primates, e.g. chimpanzees, are themselves omnivorous.

5. The paleo-humans told us so in their own language in the form of cave paintings.

Sunday, May 19, 2013

For over a decade, China's aggressive push for the renewable energy industry has resulted in a glut of solar energy products whose supply has outstripped demand. My question here is whether the supply is too high or the demand is too low?

Considering that humanity must wean itself of dependency on oil, the demand for alternative energy should be almost infinite, as long as the supply is affordable, and the mass production in China has made it more than affordable. Unfortunately, the Western powers have slapped heavy tariffs and duties on Chinese-made solar panels to keep the prices high in the N. American and European markets, to the point of pricing solar energy out of reach of the average consumer. This has caused the demise of major sectors of the Chinese solar industry.

The excuse for the tariff is "unfair trade practices", citing heavy subsidy by the Chinese government to promote the Chinese solar industry, thereby out-competing the Western solar industry. On the other hand, while there is some subsidy in the U.S. for the American solar industry, the lion's share of U.S. energy subsidies go towards the oil industry, thus keep gasoline prices relatively low and solar energy products relatively high, which of course is not conducive to Americans switching from oil to solar.

I don't see this happening with other Chinese products. Thus the reason is pressure from the oil industry.

A wise and courageous government would shake off the yoke of Big Oil, match the Chinese by transferring all subsidy into renewable energy, thus lowering the price of American-made solar panels, rather than raising the price of Chinese-made solar panels. Thus, the American people would switch from oil to solar on their own accord.

All in all, the global consumer prices solar energy remain sky high, the Chinese solar energy industry is stagnated, and Big Oil continues to sit on the throne, a throne in the master state-room of the global energy and environmental Titanic.

For more reading:
http://news.yahoo.com/special-report-rise-fall-chinas-sun-king-000953423.html

Tuesday, May 14, 2013

A HUGE CONGRATULATIONS to my trusted friend and colleague Dr. Faiyaz Khudsar (pls friend) for playing his key role in the tenacious and successful campaign spanning two decades towards winning court approval for translocating a number of Asiatic lions from Gir National Park, Gujarat, India, to the Kuno Wildlife Sanctuary, Madhya Pradesh, India.

Faiyaz and I worked closely on a daily basis at the Kanha Tiger Reserve (1996-1999), and is a key character in my book [OMNI-SCIENCE and the Human Destiny] with my 3rd trip in 1999 as its background story. (The e-version of the book is free for the asking.)

The highly endangered Asiatic Lion used to span a broad range from the Middle East to SE Asia, but has since been reduced to a single population at Gir, which however has enjoyed a modest population increase in recent years. The reason for seeking the translocation of a part of this population to Kuno is to prevent a sudden crash and possible extinction due to disease and unforeseen natural or human imposed environmental pressures. The Indian Cheetah was declared extinct in 1999. We don't want the same tragedy to befall the Indian Lion.

The court battle stemmed from the Gujarati state government's reluctance and refusal to cooperate, citing that the Asiatic Lion was a state treasure, not to be shared with Madhya Pradesh. Thankfully, in the wisdom of the Indian high court, which favoured eco-centricism over anthropo-centricism, the project has been granted.

Faiyaz, a wildlife biologist, was instrumental in ascertaining that Kuno, in fact, provides a higher prey density than Gir for the sustenance of the translocated lions, which will share with a few occasionally sighted tigers.

A difficult and expensive part of the project entails the voluntary relocation of 24 villages hitherto inhabiting Kuno, comprising some 1600 families. Each family is being allocated 2 hectare of fertile land and sufficient money to start over. This monumental task has by and large been accomplished.

For those interested, this highly complex court verdict is detailed in the following pdf document provided to me by Dr. Khudsar himself.

Monday, May 13, 2013

Today, while driving on the freeway between Vancouver BC and Bellingham WA, I scanned the AM radio, landed on a religious talkshow station, and detected a fatal flaw in their mindset, worldview and resulting behaviour.

The preacher was talking about the essence of Christianity being one of spiritual pursuit, and blasted the "Prosperity Sects" for urging their followers to pray for material wealth and worldly success. In this I fully concur.

Unfortunately, he then went off on a tangent to denigrate "The World", and in a broad stroke blasted the environmentalists as well, saying that all they care about are things material. In this he is fully misguided and delusional.

His problem is his inability to differentiate "The World" and "Planet Earth". The former refers to mansions, cars, yachts, cash, stocks, political ambition, whereas the latter refers to forests, mountains, oceans, and life itself.

Monday, May 6, 2013

I've been reading your posts on Facebook, and on your blog, and they never fail to touch me. Ever since I was 11 years old and saw a fox hunt on tv (after which I locked myself in the bathroom and cried hysterically for about an hour and a half, until I was exhausted), I have done what I can in my small way to stop animal suffering and exploitation. I have written letters, boycotted, participated in protests (and been made to look insane by the media coverage)...and on.

I am in complete admiration of your continued work to stop the brutality that humans inflict on the animal kingdom, and the environment.

I have wanted to comment so many times to your Facebook posts...and then, I read the comments. Every time you post a blog or a FB post, you are inundated with the exact SAME stream of virulent ignorance. It's like these people are reading off a cue card. And they have been saying the same things for literal decades. It makes me physically sick, and I feel that there is just NO WAY any of these hunting, meat munching, rodeo-riding, etc. enthusiasts will EVER get it.

So, I guess what I'm asking is, how do you keep your edge? How do you keep fighting against this megalithic wall of ignorance?
I burnt out back in the late 80's from it, and tried to keep my fight on the down low by simply trying to educate people, one-on-one (it's still difficult). But some days, I just wonder if it's just the way things are, and that the world is going to end in a horrible lineage of extinction, pollution, and agony, and maybe I should just say, "Yeah, that's life".

I'm sure that having to hear hunters tell you that they are responsible for the conservation of species one more time must make your blood pressure go up 20 points.

I apologize if I'm rambling, but I feel like for all the years I've invested in trying to "fight the good fight" for animals, and now I'm looking at the VERY real possibility that rhinos, elephants, pangolins, and orangutans (as well as many more) will actually become extinct IN MY LIFETIME--well, I never wanted to see this day, and it is truly breaking my heart.

Whatever your secret is, Anthony, THANK YOU for continuing. Every bear that gets rescued from a bile "farm"; every pig that isn't put in a gestation crate; every duck, chicken, and cow that doesn't end up on a factory farm thanks you, too.

May you live a long and healthy life, and keep your strength and goodness. You are a credit to this miserable passel of thumbed apes that are called human.

Very sincerely,

Dawn

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Thank you, Dawn! Let me see how I could answer your questions: "How do you keep your edge? How do you keep fighting against this megalithic wall of ignorance?"

The short answer is: With difficulty and ease, depends. :)

Here is the long answer:

The first thing I can say is that my love for Mother Earth, for all species (including our own), all individual living beings, and our future generations, is deep, constant and undying. Nothing on the surface can touch it, disturb it, diminish it or pollute it. Based on this, what the ignoramuses, psychopaths and sociopaths say or do can irritate or anger me, but cannot discourage or suppress me.

Second, I have no requirements, expectations or even need for results, rewards or success. So, even when I fail, which happens far more than when I succeed, I am never disappointed. Every failure I regard as one step closer to success. And indeed, failures often serve as the best lessons in life. In this sense, I operate much like an automaton, as programmed. If the programming is to go forward regardless, then I move forward.

Third, according to my in-born disposition, with all the human emotions intact, including love and hate, joy and pain, admiration and contempt, all of which I do feel when I encounter a new or recurrent situation, good and bad, I let them stew for however long them take, then file them into my emotional archive and move on to the intellectual, the analytical, logic and action. If anything, I feel challenged as in a chess game. The worse the opponent, the more alive I feel, and perhaps the better I play. If I lose, I learn from my mistakes, and often win the next round.

Fourth, I guess it is a matter of faith, the faith that whether or not we win a battle, the war will eventually be won, the faith that darkness cannot dim the light, but light can illuminate the darkness. As long as we are in the light, as long as we are light itself, we shall prevail.

Fifth, it is also a matter of patience. In many a demo, the chant "When do we want it?" "NOW!!" rings in my ears. If the NOW does not materialize, many become discouraged. Often enough, and some eventually burn out, if not give up in despair for good. Most of the time, I just look at our work as a progression. I see every time we do not give up as an intermediate victory. The ultimate victory, I may not live to see it, but I know that if we persevere, it will come sooner than later.

Sixth, in most cases, doing something is better than doing nothing. So I do something. And when I do something, I may as well go all out.

Seventh, compassion is a basic ingredient of an ARA, and it is or should be all encompassing, even for the enemy. I want to destroy his atrocity, but I do not want to destroy him. Even if he is a psychopath, he is born as such and it is not of his choosing. If he has learned or been conditioned to commit them, he can unlearn and be unconditioned. Even if he is intentionally evil, Karma will deal him his just reward. Even if I'm stabbed in the back, I do my best to forgive them if/when they show remorse. I harbour no hatred in my heart nor carry grudges on my shoulders, for I would otherwise be eaten from the inside out, and weighed down with unhappiness for life.

I hope these make sense. Of course, endearing input like yours carry me forward a long way.

Your friend always,

Anthony

Photo of tigress in Bandhavgrah National Park, Madhya Pradesh, India, by Anthony Marr

Saturday, May 4, 2013

Where did we come from? Some still believe that it was by the wave of a godly wand 6000 years ago. Please, catch up already!

In 1054 AD, Chinese astronomers observed and recorded a celestial event in the form of a great flash of light in the Taurus constellation, what we now understand to be the explosion of a supernova 6,500 light-years from Earth which has since become the Crab Nebula (M1/NGC1952) some 11 light-years across.

What has this to do with our origin? When the Universe was formed 13.7 billion years ago, there was nothing but hydrogen (75%) and helium (25%). But today, we breathe in nitrogen and oxygen, exhale carbon dioxide, take calcium pills, make tools out of iron, self-adorn with gold, and fire off ICBMs containing uranium. So, where did these heavier elements come from?

In a single word: NUCLEOSYNTHESIS.

Our sun is basically a sphere with a helium core and a hydrogen shell. Massive as it is, the sun is but a small yellowish star out of the 300 billion stars in our Milky Way Galaxy which in turn is but one out of 100 billion galaxies in the Universe. The star that exploded in 1054 AD, which became the Crab Nebula, was a super-massive blue star, one with an iron core, and shells (from centre to periphery) of nickel, sulphur, silicon, magnesium, neon, oxygen, carbon, helium and hydrogen, with the heavier elements fused from the lighter elements. The fusing of elements heavier than helium requires enormous pressures, of which our sun is incapable. Once an iron core is formed in a super-massive blue star, the star would explode as a supernova, and the extra pressure in the explosion would spontaneously fuse the even heavier elements.

Eventually, when the heavy-elements-laden interstellar clouds, such as those inside the Crab Nebula, gravitationally collapse into new stars, these new stars would spin their heavy atoms out into a disc, which would condense into their planetary systems. Thus our planet Earth of the Solar System, formed 4.6 billion years ago, of which we are an integral part.

Once the Earth was formed, INTEGRATIVE TRANSCENDENCE (see Anthony Marr's book OMNI-SCIENCE and the Human Destiny) and EVOLUTION (see Charles Darwin's book Origin of Species) have brought about the rise of life on Earth, including our own species, to this day.

About Anthony Marr

Anthony Marr
* has a degree in physics
* is the author of "OMNI-SCIENCE and the Human Destiny" (2003) and "Homo Sapiens SAVE YOUR EARTH" (2008)
* 1995, he cleaned up N. American Chinatowns of endangered species medicines
* 1996, he led "the highest-profile anti-trophy-hunting campaign in Canada" (Globe and Mail).
* 1997-1999, he worked in 3 tiger reserves in India.
* 1999, he founded Heal Our Planet Earth (HOPE).
* 2004/2005, he conducted operations in Japan against whaling and dolphin slaughter.
* 2003-2011, completed 7 Compassion for Animals Road Expeditions (CARE tours, each covering 30-45 states over 4-7 months), and spoke at the National AR Conference every year
* 2009, he founded the Global Anti-Hunting Coalition (GAHC)
* 2010, he won the Henry Spira Grassroots Activist Award.
www.HOPE-CARE.org
www.facebook.com/AnthonyMarr001
www.HomoSapiensSaveYourEarth.blogspot.com
www.AnthonyMarr13.wordpress.com
www.Dying-for Salvation.blogspot.com